Baseball's Tenuous Battle for Important Stuff: 4 Days To Go

Note: Baseball Before Bedtime will no longer be seen on Walkoff Walk in 2008 so that we may bring you short and mildly amusing recaps about games that made a goddamn difference in the race for the postseason. Sorry, Expos fans.

Red Sox 5, Indians 4: The Sox battered Cleveland pitcher Fausto Carmona for four first inning runs before sending out former Cleveland pitcher Paul Byrd to cough up the lead. No matter, someone named Jeff Bailey tripled in the eighth and broke a tie when scoring on a Mark Kotsay double. Just another ho-hum day in the life of mild-mannered Jefford Hamilton Woo-Woo Bailey IV!!!

Twins 3, White Sox 2: Oh, those razor-slim late September margins! MVP candidate Joe Mauer picked up a pair of RBI on a pair of fielders choices, while three Twins relievers recorded holds leading towards Joey Nathan's 39th save. White Sox now lead by just one-half of a game. Eek!

Braves 10, Phillies 4: So Brett Myers got battered around like a pound of delicious cod at a fish 'n' chips shop. Big uh-ohs and bigger question marks in Philadelphia. Chipper Jones hit his 408th career ding-dong and it was of the pinch-hit variety. Julian Tavarezalmost got into it with Shane Victorino and I have no idea why.

Cubs 9, Mets 6: For three consecutive innings, the Metropolitans had a runner on third base with no outs down by one run and scored just one run. Thanks to reliever Jeff Samardzjia who walked Ramon Martinze with the bases loaded, they finally tied it up in the eighth. Heck, those are some juicy opportunities, man! They say when opportunity knocks, you'd better answer the door with a goddamn claw hammer because opportunity will rob you blind. Derrek Lee's tenth inning RBI double off a tired Luis Ayala won it for Chicago.

Brewers 4, Pirates 2: Walkoff Walk favorite Salomon Torres closed out a CC Sabathia win on short rest, and all Dale Sveum can do is high-five Baby Jesus in his head. Such kismet! Prince Fielder picked up another RBI and waddled around to score twice. Milwaukee is now tied with New York for the wild card.